It's a racing game, but it has crashes as the feature as well as the racing. A lot of the modes are about causing massive crashes and some of the events involve punting traffic out of the way.
Paradise is offering a menu-free interface (which I'll have to see to understand) and a free world to mess around in. I'm not sure how events get started, but my guess is it'll probably be along similar lines to Test Drive Unlimited.
Burnout is pretty arcadey (and regular forum-goers will know how I usually feel about them), but I really enjoyed the Revenge demo when I played it a couple of months back. I'll be keeping an eye on Paradise too.